iTunes Now Generating Apple Over $2 Billion Per Year in Profit? [Chart]

Asymco analyst Horace Dediu takes a look at Apple's iTunes business in a new report "iTunes Business Review" which will soon be available for purchase through the Asymco Store.

In a recent blog post, Dediu offers some tidbits from the report. Notably, what's known as iTunes today has quintupled in seven years which is said to have brought some significant economies of scale. However, what has changed iTunes from a 'break-even' business to a profitable one is the inclusion of Apple Software.

My estimate is that Apple’s own software generated $3.6 billion in Revenues in 2012. As you can imagine, this is a high margin business which grows at nearly 20%/yr. Although I estimate that the software business has been overtaken by the Apps and Music businesses in gross revenues, it keeps an operating margin similar to that of Microsoft or about 50%.

This has lead Dediu to estimate a 15% operating margin on gross revenues when including Apple Software, for a profit of over $2 billion per year.